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Steam v2.0 Coming

Valve Software has just sent out word of a major upgrade to their Steam service is on the way. Generally when this stuff comes out from them you can expect a release within the next few weeks. Here's the stuff:

Steam Beta 2.0 Coming Soon

Updates for Counter-Strike, Team Fortress Classic, as well as new casual games and performance optimizations will be introduced in Steam beta 2.0, which is expected to go live early next month. Steam, Valve's broadband business platform for content delivery and management, was announced at the 2002 Game Developer's Conference in San Jose, CA. Since the launch of beta 1, over 125,000 gamers have tried Steam. Many of the game-specific features released in Steam beta 2.0 will be made available to the non-Steam community at the conclusion of this beta.

Key Features: -- V-GUI 2 plus an integrated set of communications tools that provide built-in support for a variety of services, such as instant messaging, configuration, and server browsing. -- Counter-Strike: Introduction of Riot Shield, FAMAS, and Galil. -- Team Fortress Classic: Introduction of the engineer's teleportation pad, new map from Valve (Ravelin), plus various fixes and tweaks. -- Casual Steam games: Chess, Checkers, and Go. -- Anti-cheat support for all Valve multiplayer games. -- Improved Steam performance.